Ticketmaster Developing Facial Recognition Ticketing Program

Technology in the works to allow you to “associate your digital ticket with your image, then just walk into the show”

Tickets photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Live Nation Entertainment, Ticketmaster's parent company, has announced it has invested in and formed a partnership with Blink Identity, a biometric identification company that specializes in facial recognition, as the Verge reports. The move marks the latest step in the ticketing company’s mission to replace paper ticketing with digital technology. In announcing the partnership and investment in a recent note to investors, Live Nation President and CEO Michael Rapino said that Blink Identity “has cutting-edge facial recognition technology, enabling you to associate your digital ticket with your image, then just walk into the show.”

While no concrete plans involving the technology have been announced, the Verge notes that Ticketmaster would have to build a database of its customers’ faces in order to implement the tech, a prospect that some could find intimidating.

The Blink Identity website notes that the founders of the company have “spent the last decade building and deploying large scale biometric identification systems in the Middle East for the Department of Defense.” The site boasts that their technology allows the customer to “let the good guys in (and keep the bad guys out.)”